


Talk Me Down Until We Fall Off

by RerumTechnologies



Series: General Ficlets and Fuckery [8]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Derek Hale, Derek Hale Deserves Nice Things, Derek Hale is Bad at Feelings, Dramatic Derek Hale, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Pre-Relationship, Stiles Stilinski makes Assumptions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2021-03-06 03:09:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25806391
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RerumTechnologies/pseuds/RerumTechnologies
Summary: Derek Hale was not one to give up. Hale’s didn’t back down from anything. They persevered. Derek would persevere. After he was done with his world-class pity party.Derek is sulking and Stiles decides to make an ass out of 'U' and 'Me'. No suicide in this fic, just two dramatic idiots
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Series: General Ficlets and Fuckery [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1868614
Comments: 1
Kudos: 61





	Talk Me Down Until We Fall Off

Derek Hale was not one to give up. Hale’s didn’t back down from anything. They persevered. Derek would persevere. After he was done with his world-class pity party.

The venue was good. The bridge looked over one of the rivers that fed Sly Creek Reservoir the next town over. The forest encroached on the river like it was trying to get a look at its own reflection. With the sun down and the moon up everything looked a little less real – not exactly dreamlike but that limbo between a nice dream and a nightmare. Derek took another swig from his handle. He swished it. Nearly gone. It was a cheap whiskey that he’d gotten from a gas station near the state road. It couldn’t affect him, of course, but the alcohol had seemed fitting for the private funeral. Actually, Derek thought he recognised it as the brand Laura had gotten caught with by Uncle Peter. He scolded her for poor taste and shown her where their mom kept the good wolfsbane laced whiskey in the study. Derek thought about how clever he’d thought he was, spying on Uncle Peter and Laura. No one knew that _Derek_ knew where the whiskey was. He’d stolen some the next week to bring with him to… to his and Kate’s first date.

He took another swig.

God, he’d been so fucking stupid. They’d been fourteen strong, and with one stupid mistake, Derek had managed to cut the Hales down to three. Then Peter had killed Laura, leaving them at two. And Derek had killed Peter. Leaving him alone.

He’d never been alone. There’d been too many Hales wandering around for him to really ever be alone before the fire. After the fire, Laura had made sure they stayed together. Even when they weren’t physically close, neither of them had ever been alone. Impossible in New York. But now he had no one. An Alpha without a Pack. What was he supposed to do? Laura would’ve known what to do. She’d always had plans. Plans for pranks, to sneak out, to sneak in.

_“Listen, Der here’s the plan,” she punched his arm, “Pay attention to your Alpha, Der-bear.”_

_“Shut up, Laura, you’re not my Alpha yet,” but he settled down and paid attention to Laura’s plan._

_But Laura was gone._ He took another drink, let his head fall back. They were out of plans.

He jolts out of his brooding when some kid sits down next to him, “Hey, I’m Stiles. Whatcha doin’?”

Derek stares at the kid for a moment. He was late teens, pale skin, buzz cut, and all gangly limbs. “What does it look like.”

The kid – Stiles – hums, “Well, it looks like you’re about to jump off a bridge. But I have to warn you the fall won’t kill you.” Derek blinked. Jump? He opened his mouth to tell this busybody he wasn’t going to – “Might be able to drown yourself…” Stiles trailed off looking down at the water contemplatively, then started up again like he’d never stopped, “But that’s a lot harder to do than most people think. That’s a lot of trouble to go through just cause you’re having a rough time. And dude, I gotta say, someone who looks like you? Things will _definitely_ get better. Trust me. You don’t wanna do this.”

Derek just kept staring at him. Okay maybe sitting on the railing of the bridge looked a little suspicious, but what the hell did this kid care? Derek waited for a pause in the word vomit to tell him he wasn’t gonna jump and that he could leave. Him. Alone. “Bro, you’re young and pretty, if a little grumpy and obviously not a talker. Whoever you’ve got at home is gonna miss you.” At this point, Derek laughed. There _wasn’t_ anyone waiting at home. His home was burned, his apartment in New York was empty. He was alone. Stiles was looking at him funny. Derek took another drink. Stiles keeps staring at him. Oh, guess it’s his turn.

What was supposed to come out was _“I’m not suicidal, please go away,”_ but instead he said, “My family is dead.” That got him to shut up at least. Blessed silence fell between them as Stiles took that in. The wind shifted at that moment, and Derek got a face full of Stiles’ scent. There were the typical smells of a teenage boy like sweat, testosterone, and grass and the more specific stuff that Derek attributed to Stiles himself, like motor oil, burgers, fries… and werewolf.

Derek stiffened. Werewolf? Was there an omega in his territory? Another Alpha? The scent wasn’t strong enough for Stiles to be the werewolf, but whoever it was, Stiles was close with them.

“My mom’s dead.” Derek focused on him, his stiffened shoulders dropping in surprise. That same awkward moment passed. That moment where it’s decided whether you were ‘sorry for their loss’ or you were just sorry. He knew the pain of losing family. But he still didn’t know what to say. There would never be something to say. “My dad’s the only family I have left,” Stiles sighs and grins, “But it’s not so bad, because you get to adopt people into your family. I adopted Scott. And Scott came with Melissa. Scott’s adopting Isaac cause he’s a huge puppy – Scott not Isaac – I think I might be becoming attached to Erica. And I _know_ Erica is attached to Boyd.” There was a pause, and then Stiles continued in that way he seemed to have where he was just talking like he never started or stopped, he just always has been. “And Scott’s getting attached to this new girl Allison, but that’s a whole other story because something about her eyes or her smell or whatever,” Stiles rolls his eyes, “You’ll have to ask him. And believe me, he’ll tell you. I just spent two hours of my life convincing him that his kind-of date with her on Friday won’t end in disaster. Seriously he’s gotten so much worse at this since-” Stiles cuts himself off and glances sideways.

Oh. A new werewolf. That explains it. Dawning horror and guilty happiness were creeping up on Derek. There was only one Alpha werewolf in Beacon Hills since the last full moon. And Peter had been running around free for a day or two before Derek found him. This Scott was probably a bitten Hale beta. _His_ beta.

“Oh, Scott’s the werewolf.” Derek isn’t expecting Stiles to flail in surprise. He definitely wasn’t expecting him to flail so badly he _fell off the bridge_.

“Motherfu-” Derek launched himself forward, catching the boy in less than a second and turning them both so that his back would take the worst of the impact from the water. It hurt – something definitely broke – but it wasn’t the worst he’s ever felt. He pulled them both back up to the surface, dragging Stiles to the muddy shore. Derek flopped onto his back. He’d lost his bottle on the way down. Stiles coughed up half his lungs before falling down beside him.

“Woah. Thanks, man. That was…” Stiles coughed a laugh. “That was wicked cool.” Then Stiles sat up way too fast for someone who just fell three stories. “Wait a minute. You – you said werewolf. Are you a werewolf?” Stiles peered at him interestedly. Derek flashed his eyes. Stiles frowned, confused but still surprisingly unafraid. “Scott’s eyes aren’t red, they’re yellow.”

“Gold. He’s a beta, I’m an Alpha.”

“Alpha…? Oh, shit” His heart rate sped up, and the smell of fear begins to seep sluggishly from beneath his wet clothes. This was the reaction Derek had been expecting. This kid met a strange werewolf on a bridge and wasn’t scared? Did he have no self-preservation? “You… you wouldn’t happen to be the crazy rampaging werewolf we’ve been trying to track down for like a week.”

Sharp pain constricted his heart. “No,” he looks back at the sky, “He’s dead.”

Stiles huffed from beside him, “Really? And I’m just supposed to take your word for it?”

Derek turned his head to stare at him, still not bothering to get up, “I killed him.” Stiles scooted away. Derek rolled his eyes.

“Okay… Well, you’ve definitely got the serial killer brow thing going for you.”

“He killed my sister,” he decided to mention that the ‘crazy rampaging werewolf’ was also his uncle, “I’m not a serial killer.” He was alone. Wait, he wasn’t alone. Scott was his, wasn’t he? He had a pack, didn’t he?

“Damn, I’m sorry,” Stiles scooted back to his original spot next to Derek in the mud. He kept glancing at Derek, it looked like he was chewing something over. Derek waited him out. “So… if you’re an Alpha… does that mean you can help Scott? ‘Cause I gotta say, I don’t know any other werewolves, but Scotty don’t werewolf so good. Could you, I don’t know, like, give him some pointers?”

Derek didn’t say anything. He was stuck on the fact that _he had a pack_. Eventually, he managed, “Yeah.” Derek would eventually have to tell Scott who bit him, and who his Alpha was, but now… now Stiles was saying something.

“What?”

“Dinner. Do you,” Stiles pointed at Derek and stopped, “Dude, what’s your name?”

Derek smiled. It occurred to him he hadn’t smiled at all in at least a few weeks, “Derek Hale.” Stiles's eyes widened a bit. His smell grew a little warmer, and his face pinked. So, he knew the name at least. His story was probably pretty big in a small town like Beacon Hills. There was also something else in his smell. Something headier…?

“Okay, Derek Hale. Do you wanna come over for dinner?” Stiles clambered non-too gracefully to his feet and offered Derek a hand up.

Derek took it, “Dinner sounds good.”

They started picking their way through trees back to the road. Halfway there, Stiles spoke again. “Wait. Since you’re a werewolf, that fall wouldn’t have killed you.”

“Nope.”

“So you were never going to jump?” Stiles looked mortified.

Derek grinned, baring his teeth at him, “Nope.” Stiles’ face pinked up again, his heart rate spiked, and he turned to stomp towards the road. That warm, heady smell was there again in the trees.

**Author's Note:**

> THANK YOU EVERYONE WHO PARTICIPATED IN MY SURVEY!
> 
> I had this hilarious image of Derek being super dramatic and sitting forlornly on the side of a bride and of course who would come to his rescue?? The spastic Sheriff's kid, that's who. After this I imagine them having completely normal lives (besides the whole werewolf thing) and nothing else traumatic happens to either of them except Stiles accidentally seeing Scott and Allison having sex or something
> 
> Hope you enjoyed it! If you feel the urge to find me on tumblr, I'm under the same name :)
> 
> Leave a comment on your way out and may you find many happy OTPs and AUs!


End file.
